The One Thing That Changes Everything
by ee-ii-ee-ii-oo
Summary: One conversation over a lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches can change everything, as Juliette and Avery discover. Continuation of Episode 3.09. One Shot.


**The One Thing That Changes Everything**

So, I had to get one more story in before this week's episode. This is a continuation of where Juliette and Avery ended Episode 3.09. One Shot. I just felt something was missing between this scene and the first scene in 3.10. So this is my attempt to fill in that gap. It is all about the conversation that happens that just might be what brings Avery back to reality when it comes to Juliette. It's amazing how much can happen over peanut butter and jelly sandwiches...

As always, I own nothing (If I did, tv seasons would be 40 episodes long and there would be no such thing as a hiatus!)

Please review ... you know I love to see what you all think.

* * *

_"I was in the neighborhood."_

Neither one was sure how long they stood there silently, but the peace in the air wasn't lost on either of them. It was like suddenly they were really and truly friends again, like they'd been the night she flew to Dallas to tell off the Wentworths. They both chose to ignore the electricity that bubbled under the surface. It was there, but remained hidden as Juliette finally looked away from him and her stomach growled loudly.

"Lunch time." She giggled lightly as she turned to walk toward the kitchen. "Have you eaten?"

"Not yet," he replied, seemingly torn about whether he should leave or follow her.

"I'm just making a sandwich, but there's plenty for two," she said, smiling as she pulled a jar of peanut butter from the pantry.

Avery looked skeptically at her as he followed her. "You aren't putting anything crazy on that, are you? Like pickles? Isn't that what pregnant women crave? Pickles and Peanut butter?"

She rolled her eyes, opening the fridge. "That's an unfair stereotype of pregnant women. For your information, I haven't craved anything stranger than a ridiculous amount of cauliflower, which is weird because I never liked it before. And I only dipped it in chocolate sauce once." He felt himself turning green until she looked back at him with laughter in her eyes, and he knew she was just kidding. She walked back over to the granite island with a jar of jelly in her hands. "Strawberry work?"

"Sure," he nodded.

She pulled four slices of bread from a bag and began to assemble their sandwiches. "So when are you and Sadie going to start on the album?"

"She's sending me some of her demos over tonight and we'll get together tomorrow to see where we want to start," he said, as he reached up into a cabinet to pull out two plates. The domesticity of the moment was a familiar feeling that pulled his heart back in time. "She's got studio time at Blackbird starting next week."

"Wow, that's great. I downloaded some of her stuff last night, before she and I talked and ... my God, the woman can just flat out sing." She sighed, wistfully as she smoothed a layer of peanut butter over a slice of bread. "I can't wait to hear what you guys do. She's a great songwriter too."

He nodded, walking back over to the island, plates in hand. "Yeah, she and Gunnar actually have written a couple of things together. I think that's mostly what she's sending over."

"Sadie Stone and Gunnar Scott," she said as her hands stilled and she stared across the room at nothing. A smile played on her lips. "That's a deadly combination if ever I've heard one. No doubt a hit or two will come from those sessions."

"Speaking of songs," he hesitated, not fully sure that he could bring the subject up without bringing his emotions back up with it. He leaned against the granite top of the island and watched her as he finally summoned the courage to ask. "That one you were singing the night I brought the crib over. I ... hadn't heard that one before."

She blushed a bit and turned away to place the dirty knife in the sink, though she knew that was really just an excuse to avoid meeting his eyes. "Oh, that? It was just something I was playing around with. I'd sent Rayna some stuff over and she didn't like any of it. So I was just, you know, trying out some other things," she explained with a shrug.

"It was beautiful."

She suddenly had the answer to the question she'd been mulling for months. She hadn't been at all certain of how much of the song he'd heard, but with those three softly spoken words, she knew he'd heard enough to know that it was about him. About them. And it had affected him. But that was too much for her deal with at that moment. She had promised herself only hours before that she would somehow stop thinking of him in that way. But his soft voice, the way he said it, pushed her heart right back over the line she promised herself she wouldn't cross again. Finally after a few minutes of silence, she shook her head and turned back toward him steeling herself against her emotions. "Thanks, but I didn't get very far on it."

"Sounded like it was a finished product to me," he said a little too casually, as if he was also trying to block any emotional connection to the song.

Juliette scoffed. "Hardly. Plus, nothing else has come to me. It may never get finished." She let out a long sigh as she put the sandwiches on the two plates, and looked at them as if something was missing. "There is a bag of potato chips in the pantry. Can you grab it?"

He did as she asked, also grabbing two bottles of water from the fridge as they began to move into the living room. "It will ... get finished, I mean."

She groaned a little as she sat down on the sofa and immediately propped her feet up on the leather ottoman. "I don't know, Avery. Things were just getting back on track. People were buying my songs again and coming to the shows, I had the movie, but having to cancel the end of the tour and ... now with the baby, I just feel like my career's completely stalled out. Rayna told me to take my time, to take care of myself, and that we'd get started back up with a record once the baby comes," she said, a tinge of bitterness in her voice. She saw the hurt look in his eyes and backtracked immediately. "I'm not blaming it on the baby, and wouldn't trade having her for anything. Please don't think that. But I just feel like career-wise, I'm going backward, you know."

He nodded, the hurt disappearing as quickly as it had appeared, being replaced by genuine understanding. "I do. But Rayna's right. Your next record is going to get made and it's going to be amazing but you can't force it. Taking care of yourself and our daughter is what's important right now."

As he said it, she felt the baby change positions. She smiled and rubbed her belly. "I know. It's just driving me crazy, not having anything out there. And having half a song written, no producer and a studio that's been empty for way too long doesn't build a lot of confidence for getting it done when the time does come."

He froze with his sandwich half way to his mouth. "What do you mean, no producer?" he asked incredulously, leaning back in his chair.

"I ... uh .." she stammered a bit, trying to come up with a good way to take her words back. Finally, she just said what she'd been thinking about for a while. "You'd still produce my album ... after everything?"

"Well, yeah. I think we make a pretty good team in the studio," he paused, realizing he sounded pretty presumptuous. "I mean it's up to you."

Unable to stop her stomach from growling, she finally took a bite of her sandwich. "Of course I want you to produce my album. I just wasn't sure you'd want to."

"I figured it was surefire employment," he responded with a wide smile and a wink.

Juliette shot a smile back at him, and for a while they fell into a comfortable silence as they continued to eat their food.

"How did the performance go last night?" He raised his eyebrows at her question, confusion marring his face. "You and Gunnar and Zoey play at Winterville Nashfest, right?"

Realization hit him and he shook his head. "Sort of. Zoey bailed on us half an hour before we went on."

"What?!" Juliette's eyes went wide at the revelation, surprised that her obviously ambitious backup singer had just walked out on an opportunity to play for thousands, including dozens of music industry insiders.

Avery popped a hand full of chips into his mouth. "She and Gunnar broke up a couple weeks ago, and things got ... ugly last night. Really ugly. And right in front of Noel Laughlin."

Juliette couldn't help but let her jaw drop a bit at the manager's name. "Yikes. So you and Gunnar did the show as a duo?"

"Nope. Scarlett filled in." Juliette stilled as she let that information register. Avery watched her face carefully for a reaction.

Finally she nodded. "Good for her. I'm glad she's singing again. She's too talented to just be a songwriter," she said honestly. "After what happened in Chicago, I didn't think ..." Her voice faded out as she thought better of bringing up the incident that had led to her bad decision, and ultimately to their breakup. She could tell from the look on his face that he didn't want to relive it either.

"Well," he said, clearly desperate to not think about it, "she almost lost it at one point, but she pushed through. Turned out to be a pretty good set actually."

A genuine smiled graced her face. "I'm glad. So ... are you three going to do it again?" she asked casually.

"I have no idea. Maybe occasionally, but with the baby coming and working on Sadie's album, I just don't want to commit to too much else. I don't want to miss anything with the baby, you know. And I mean, it's not that I don't want to perform anymore - I do - but I just feel like I get more out of being in the studio, creating something permanent." He sighed and leaned forward, looking down at his feet. "It's not at all what I came to Nashville to do, but its the most fulfilling thing to me now, musically at least. I should get that satisfaction from being on stage. I used to. I still do sometimes, but none of that is anything like what I felt when you and I were working on 'Don't Put Dirt" or when I put the finishing touches onto Deacon's Bluebird album. Plus, if Scarlett sticks with it, it's kind of hard to compete with the chemistry those two have."

"They are amazing together," she nodded as she polished off another bite of her sandwich.

"You've heard them?" Avery hadn't realized his friends had really been on Juliette's radar before they got together.

Setting her plate to the side, she curled her feet up underneath her. "Yeah, at Deacon's birthday party at the Bluebird last year. I needed her help getting him there, so I told her they could do a song if she held up her end of the bargain. Probably wouldn't have done that if I'd known how great they are."

Avery stared out the terrace window, thinking back to that time, and putting all the pieces together. "I was there that night," he said softly before turning back to look at her.

"You were?" It was her turn to look confused. "I didn't know that."

He chuckled a little at the irony. "Not inside. I went there out of habit, not realizing that someone," he said pointedly at her, "had rented the whole place out for the night. Got turned away at the door. So watched them singing through the window. And I was jealous."

"Were y'all together then?" Juliette asked softly, tenderness clear in her blue eyes.

Scoffing, he shook his head. "Definitely not. She pretty much hated my guts and I certainly wasn't on his list of favorite people. And I deserved every bit of that." He frowned. "No, I was jealous of the musical freedom they had. They could sing whatever they wanted to up on that stage and I was trapped in a mess of contracts and songs that weren't mine. That was the same time that I was recording with Dominic. "

"Ah," she responded knowingly. When they were together, he'd told her all about his time with Marilyn and Dominic.

He nodded. "Yeah. I think ... watching them sing at the Bluebird together made me realize that I was miserable. That I wasn't enjoying the music anymore. That the contract I was in wasn't a good move for me. I burned the masters a few nights later."

"Well, then I guess throwing that party for Deacon really was worth it," she said in nearly a whisper, as she stared at him. He raised an eyebrow and she knew he wasn't following her train of thought. She'd seen that look many times over the past year. "If you hadn't had that revelation, you never would have needed that roadie gig and we might not have ever met. We wouldn't have her," Juliette felt her voice catch in her throat as she looked down at her belly.

He nodded, but seemed unable to respond. There was something unsaid, something that was plain as day to both of them. That undeniable thing they just always had between them that couldn't really be put into words. But they really didn't need words in that moment. It was a certain kind of solidarity they both felt. Like they knew at that moment that they would figure all of this out and be able to co-parent their little girl without all the insecurities and painful memories that had vanished over the course of the past half an hour.

Finally Juliette broke the silence. "She needs a name. We haven't even talked about names."

"We've got time," he responded as she shook himself out of the moment. He stood, picked up their plates and moved to put them in the kitchen sink.

She remained seated, but turned enough on the sofa to watch him. She scoffed at his confidence. "Not much, in case you haven't noticed this huge belly I've been carrying around. She'll be here in about a month!"

He knew that of course, but hearing it spoken out loud caused a bit of panic to rise up inside of him. "Got anything in mind?" he asked, trying to keep his voice even and casual. He was pretty sure he failed miserably.

"Nope." She watched as he put the dishes in the dishwasher and then make his way back to the living room. "I keep thinking I'll know it when I hear it."

"Well," Avery said as he sat down on the ottoman right in front of her, "if it helps, my mom emailed me a list of family names the other day. She told me to tell you that we don't have to feel obligated to use any of them, but she thought it might be helpful since we haven't come up with anything yet. I think she's worried about her granddaughter not having a name for six months if you and I are too stubborn to agree on anything."

Juliette couldn't stop the giggle that fell from her lips. "I think she's got us figured out. It couldn't hurt to see the list." He pulled out his phone and looked for the email. She could tell that he was on a mission now that he realized how close they were to welcoming their little girl. She sighed, thinking though her next words carefully. "You're mom's great, Avery. I'm ... I'm really glad our daughter is going to have her for a grandmother. She's exactly the kind of mother I always wanted growing up."

He glanced up at her briefly with a smile as he continued to search through his phone. "She's not perfect, but she's patient. She's somehow managed to stay married to my father for nearly 30 years, which pretty much sets her up for sainthood, if you ask me. It breaks her heart that my sister has pretty much stopped communicating with any of us. I think that's one reason she's so excited about the baby. She sees her as maybe a second chance. She likes you too. Before they went home the day after the CMAs she couldn't stop talking about you. In fact, she told me the other day she'd like to fly back down here before the baby comes and spend a little more time with you. You don't have to, but ..."

"I'd love that," Juliette cut off his words without hesitation.

"Okay, I'll tell her." He smiled at her and moved to the seat next to her on the sofa, handing her his phone. "Here are the names she sent."

"Thresa, Katie, Elva," Juliette grimaced as she read Sandra's list. "Beatrice, Vivian. ... Oh, I like that. Write that one down." He grabbed a notepad that was sitting on a nearby table and wrote down the name. Within a half an hour, they had narrowed the list down to four names.

"We don't have to make a final decision today, Avery. We can just leave it at these four and then decide when she gets here. There's not that big of a rush."

"Yeah." He looked down at his phone again to see a text from Sadie saying she was about to send him the demos. He looked back up at Juliette hoping she didn't see the disappointment on his face. "I've got to head out. I've got to get some work done before I meet up with her tomorrow."

"Of course." As he stood, she held up her hand to him. "Help me up."

He rolled his eyes at her. "You don't have to walk me out."

"You want me to leave the front door unlocked for all kinds of vagrants and psychos to make themselves at home here?"

"No," he responded quickly as a variety of horrible scenarios played in his mind.

She smiled at him sweetly and held her hand up higher. "Then help me up."

As he took her hand and pulled her up, that old familiar feeling rose up within her, and she knew that she had to admit defeat. As much as she told herself that she wasn't going there anymore, she couldn't help it. It was pointless to try to not be in love with him, probably in that moment with his child moving around inside of her more than when the were together. But, she would stick to what she told him - that she would just be a friend from now on - even if it was killing her on the inside. She pushed away the thought that the look in his eyes might mean something more, because it just hurt too much to hope he'd be willing to trust her again. When she was finally on her feet she followed him toward the door.

He paused with his hand on the door knob. "Thanks again, for talking to Sadie."

"I'm just glad it worked," she grinned, hands propped on top of her stomach. "Just promise me you'll be done with her in time to work on my album."

He laughed. "I promise."

"Good."

"I'll ... check in with you later." He placed a gentle hand on her shoulder, briefly and she fought not to shiver under his touch. "Let me know if you need anything. And I'll find out when Mom is planning to come down."

A genuine smile appeared on her face. "I'm really looking forward to it."

He nodded. And turned to go.

"Hey, Avery?"

He stopped cold at the sound of his name off her lips. "Yeah?"

"Thanks for today," she continued, voice almost whisper soft. "I needed the company."

Nodding, he smiled back at her. "It was good. I think we both needed it. I'll call you later."

"Bye," she waved as he turned away.

It took every ounce of strength inside of him to keep going, to put one foot in front of the other, rather than turn around and go back inside. He had missed it, the friendship they'd had before. They were back where they started and he knew it should make him feel comfortable, happy with where they were. Happy that they'd be bringing their daughter into a world where her mother and father could be in a room with each other and not end up in some epic screaming match. Yet, something gnawed at him, and had been since he had first stopped by nearly two hours before. Why, when she was talking about him dating other women, did he feel sick to his stomach? He should be glad she was finally accepting the fact that he didn't trust her... except that he did. Despite his better judgement and the fact that what she did to him still hurt like hell, he did trust her. As he got in his truck and drove out of the posh gated community, he couldn't help but wonder if that changed anything.

Even though he knew deep in his heart that it changed everything ...

* * *

Please leave me a comment! Would love to know what you thought!


End file.
